Doug_N

3 hours ago, JKEdmo said:

 

 

Price vs. features.  I felt it was very competitive compared to other products such as Vectorworks, Autocad Architecture, etc.  You might even say I made the jump because of the lower cost.

Decisions based on price can be good for casual users, but when it comes to serious professional practitioners, well then I think the metric changes.  For example, have you ever seen a professional carpenter use a Black and Decker power saw?  I bet they would have a Milwaukee or a DeWalt.  Same for auto mechanics.  A guy tinkering in his garage would probably have a Master Craft socked set, but an auto mechanic who earns their living with their tools may have Snap On or Milwaukee.  Why pay more for tools with similar features?  They are more reliable, have better features.    

4 minutes ago, JKEdmo said:

I'm a Chief newbie and I'd like to add that a big reason I bought X14 was its value relative to its competitors.

 

For what it's worth, that's my two cents!

 

Jim

 

When you say value, what do you mean?

3 hours ago, Doug_N said:

Larry is how I spell Rich, it's a Canadian spelling.  Well that's my story and I am sticking to it.

Awww COME ON!  Someone downvoted a corny joke???   What is this world coming to?

Rich, your the man.  Your statistical analysis of who read what was very interesting, and it actually gave me pause to think.  What is it that we (users of CA) find really important?  Technical help of the cost of licensing the product?  If cost is the only thing that matters we would all be using SketchUp or PC paint.  But I suppose this change to the license is sort  of like stubbing your toe.  For the moment the pain is all we think about.  That and whether or not the kids heard what we said about stubbing our toe.  

Anyhow, nicely done Rich

2 hours ago, HumbleChief said:

I think the analysis credit goes to Rich...

Larry is how I spell Rich, it's a Canadian spelling.  Well that's my story and I am sticking to it.

It seems changing the terms of use and making the program a subscription program has affected everyone and nearly everyone who was part of the forum had something to say about it.  a glitch or an educational video may only affect a few of us, and then only fewer say anything about it.  I know I don't read every post, maybe net even half of them and I am a pretty active member on this forum.  But I certainly had a lot to say about this license change.  Larry that was an astounding analysis though.  Perhaps you missed your calling and should have been a forensic accountant!  Your post casts a very interesting light on what turns our cranks!  Well done.

Here is what it boils down to.  

CA has changed how they are going to license their products, namely by moving to a complete subscription model rather than a maintenance/upgrade model.

1. In some circumstances to be determined by CA a licence can be transferred to another party.
2. CA is the sole arbiter as to what those circumstances are.
3. Users never owned the software, they only had a license to use exclusively a copy of the software, and only on one computer at a time, (one for each license held.)
4. CA has made everyone who is a current user, or investigates becoming a future user that the rules have changed and there will be no NEW permanent licenses after Jan 10, 2023
5. Existing current SSA users will still, and continue to have, permanent licenses unless their SSA lapses.  In that case they will not be able to renew the SSA on a permanent license.
6. Any perceived value to the license holder has been removed for most cases, (pretty much in line with other competitors.)  
7. Any further discussion is beating a dead horse because CA isn't going to budge on this issue.  Their mind is made up.
8. Dead horse beaters are welcome to continue posting, but there isn't much point in the rest of us reading those posts any more.  I think we all now know what everyone thinks.

10 hours ago, DavidJames said:

 

If there's any interest from users in this forum, I don't mind creating a tutorial on how I use Revit for residential work. You'd be surprised at how quick, easy, and headache-free Revit is to use once you get over the learning curve and you set up libraries (families) etc. Everything about the user experience is extremely polished and all the tools provided are a godsend. You'll never encounter strange anomalies with the software that will require "work-arounds" to fix the issue, nor will the software ever fight back. Everything just works, and works really well. 

Ultimately Revit is insanely powerful for design and you can do just about anything. 

David,

Are you talking about Revit or Revit LT?  There is a big difference in the cost of the two.  I outlined in an earlier post the similarities and differences between Revit LT and CA.  For houses, I still think CA has a significant advantage, but I certainly will keep an open mind and would like to see any practical demonstration of the two of them in a head-on presentation.  That, as well as Rene's offer are very generous.

12 hours ago, lbuttery said:

A condition suddenly becoming inconvenient for you does not establish bad faith.

 

Ummm, yes it is bad faith 

 

they allow A  for decades and then they stop A - NOT allowed - with NO warning

 

that is BAD FAITH

 

Lew

Lew,

What would you consider good faith?  If the ongoing model is a subscription model only, then what is your investment worth?  How much notice would you accept, when every potential buyer would know that they can't upgrade, can't get SSA anymore? 

Now there are two paths to continue in the future.

For existing current users, keep paying the SSA and get a substantial discount as compensation for lost value on a resale. if your SSA lapses you can still keep using the program but not update, nor opt back in.

For new or lapsed users, pay the subscription price (annually or monthly) and if the subscription lapses the program is disabled.

Imagine how I felt have purchased an AutoDESK full suite for AutoCAD and Inventor for $11,500 and then be told, you have to switch to the subscription. I was already in the subscription stream with the annual maintenance program, which updated my products automatically.  What about my investment in that crazy expensive license?  Too bad.  Oh but I did get a substantial discount of the subscription if I kept it current.  I still felt bitter, but at least I did get the discount compared to those others coming into the program later. The permanent licenses were cancelled!  No chance of carrying on with the last version, it stopped working.  Well CA is offering us a better deal than that.  Think about it.  I am not sure about transferring the older license between machines in the future, but how long would you expect a company to support an old version?  

Now what about your work?  Do you allow your clients to resell your designs for buildings to others?  I suspect that the design is your copyright, and you have some provision in your drawings and contracts that prohibits that (or you should).  I get the hard feelings, but what CA is doing is to protect their long-term viability, and to get a firm financial footing to keep improving and maintaining the product for both current users and future users, It is a wise decision even if it is not that popular.  A really popular decision with be to offer the program for free but that wouldn't be sustainable.  So I feel your pain, but would ask you to reflect on the reality facing the company in staying financially healthy, 

Rene, Yeah me too.  I would love to see this.  I have done an entire house and permit application in one day, so I know it can be done, The hard part is not so much the building model, it is the construction drawings and specifications.  That is where elbow grease is required. Please keep us posted.  

1 hour ago, HumbleChief said:

That is the point. There are questions about the future price of SSA and needing some guidelines about that future price and just like the price of eggs, it will go up, plan on it.

Larry, I agree with you completely.  Any who thinks this is the last price increase from CA is not paying attention to the rest of the world.  Of course, the price will go up, even if it is just to keep pace with inflation.

Also I see a lot of griping about the differential between Chief, Revit, AutoCAD (not really a great tool for houses), ArchiCAD etc.  If the only reason you are using CA is the price, well then, by all means switch.  You can use a wrench as a hammer, but it may not be the best tool. In my professional opinion, CA is the best tool (THE BEST TOOL) (for those not listening) for designing houses.  There are still some issues.  Setting up wall alignments, small offsets along a wall, railing offsets, deck attachments to an exterior wall, and deck support flexibility among others, but by and large, CA is the best in its class and getting better.  

I for one, can hardly wait for X15 to launch, so I am a current SSA subscriber. Keep tuned and pay your damned SSA so that you will get it as well.

Regarding this user group.  One of the features that makes this such a great group is that CA supports it.  Every once and a while there will be someone from CA that will comment on our post, issue a helpful comment or suggest that we make a comment in the suggestion forum, or even contact support.  What other company does that?  None that I am aware of.  

To all of my colleagues out there who support this user group and forum, thank you, thank you thank you.  I feel that you are all out there hoping for my success, just as I do for you.  What a great group.  I feel privileged to be part of this.

https://www.nvidia.com/download/driverresults.aspx/147971/en-us/

If you are not using the studio driver (instead of the gaming driver) then you may experience crashes or poorer performance in my experience.

I think some of you are missing an important aspect of marketing the program to new users. 

One of the hard selling points of the current sales models is the initial buy in at about 3k.  The new model lowers that hurdle to 2k.  This should open the door for more first-time users by lowering the bar.  Right now, you can rent CA for $200 per month.  That is the same as the new model.   The company needs to change its revenue model to keep up with development and improvements as the program becomes more fully featured and configurable.  Making changes often means rewriting existing code to make everything compatible, and as a former code writer, I know that sometimes you have painted your program into a corner and to make an improvement it means a serious trashing of existing code, and long hours of doing a major rewrite.  

There can be a number of reasons for that.  For example, something that is baked into the code now is going to be a variable, so every place that the variable is used error trapping has to be written to ensure that the program doesn't make ridiculous decisions.  Debugging new code is a mind-numbing process.  Most of that is done long before a program is ready for BETA testing.

We all wanted CA to expand and be more capable.  Well now we are getting that, and we have to pay for those new features.

As for comparing CA to Word or MS Office pricing, how many users does MS Office have V.S, CA users?  The fewer the users, the higher the cost burden.  

Anyone know if I can get a circle's diameter or radius in Ruby?

3 hours ago, Chrisb222 said:

 

Doug, maybe you meant to quote the thread author. I don't have any problems showing terrain in elevations, but thanks for the info.

 

You can probably edit your post to tag the OP so he is sure to be notified of your great tips.

Chris

I was just adding to your good post.

4 hours ago, Smn842 said:

 

Your comment suggests the email stated the SSA price is fixed at that price from now on - did they actually state that?  I ask because I contacted CA a few days ago and they wouldn't make any statements about the ongoing SSA cost even in 2023.

 

I've not received that email yet and I am interested in the price as I am only a DIY/hobby user of Chief Premier.  I've had SSA since X9 but if the cost moves up towards subscription levels then it becomes too much for my non profit use.

Not a fixed price, the same price for the next billing period.  +

1 hour ago, Chrisb222 said:

 

Nothing, the program is showing the terrain as it exists at the elevation cut line and beyond.

 

I have never (seldom, should say) been able to get automatic terrain lines to show how I want in elevation. I turn them off and use CAD.

The trick in the section view is to use cad lines and you can use the terrain perimeter layer to assist in creating those likes by doing a view to cad, deleting the lines that you don't want, adding lines to fill in where you need them, then making all the cad lines you want into a block.  Edit the block and change the lines to some custom layer such as "terrain section 1" and then save it.  Now go back to the section view, turn off the terrain perimeter layer, and use past and hold to past the block.  If you can't see it, make sure that you turn on your custom layer.  That should be what you need.

For those of you that have been comparing CA to Revit Lt, isn't this sort of comparing a wrench to a pair of pliers?  They both are tools to get a job done, and they will both do somewhat similar things, but here is a list of some (picked by me) features side by side and a cost comparison. I only did the comparison for Revit Lt.   If you are on a apple, forget Revit or any AutoCAD product.  Apple is not supported.

Here is a link to the US Revit site to do your own investigation https://www.autodesk.com/products/revit/compare

I have been thinking about this change a lot.  I wonder how much of the house design market that CA has?  How much can it grow? I do a fair bit of work in the Toronto and surrounding area here in Canada, and I don't run into many designers or architects that are my competitors that use CA.  Why not, I wonder?  No sales presence in Canada is only likely reason.  But Canada is a much smaller market as well, perhaps 10% of the US market.  

As for the pricing model in the near future, the subscription model is not much different than the SSA agreement.  No perpetual license model is a problem for anyone who has a long dry period in business, but there seems to be a drift in this direction from all software companies, and even some automobile companies. (Yes I am looking at you GM and Tesla).  

In my opinion, the step here is a bit of a stumble.  It lets in people who would have balked at the current perpetual license fee of $3,295 that is true.  I wonder how many of us are SSA subscribers?  Would we all be willing to pay, say, $750 per year to help CA achieve a better level of sustainability?  In a way this increase will have the newcomers paying to haul our freight to some extent, but over time we will fade out, and in a decade or so, there will only be newcomers.  

I am an AutoCad subscriber as well, and still have my license, but let me tell you, AutoDesk does not support their users the way that Chief does.  They are constantly changing and fractionalizing their products, so you have to bob and weave to get what you need to do what you did last year.  No point in complaining to AutoDesk either because they are deaf to user pain.  

The support that CA supplies in the forum is so much appreciated, that I can't believe my luck to be a CA user. That is what sets CA apart from other companies in this field.  In any case, after this long winded and rambling post, I offer my assurance that I will continue to be a CA user and maintain my SSA and even support a modest bump in price to see CA succeed. 

Ahh the thread in announcements!  I didn't see that.

I saw that on the website, but what thread are you referring to?

According to an email that I just received from CA, as of January 10, 2023 CA will only be available as a subscription license.  For those of us that have a current CA license with a paid up SSA agreement, our agreement continues at the same price ($595 per year) so long as the SSA does not lapse.  If you let it lapse, then you are required to switch to the subscription model and that is going to cost Annual subscription: $1,995 (if paid annually).  

If there ever was a incentive to get or keep your SSA agreement in place...  this is it!

Nice catch Glenn

There are two ways.

I) start with a metric template

or

2) Change the dimension format to metric. 

In this plan the coach house is a symbol, so there is not much that can be done with that.  Do you have the plan file for that building?  It is sort of implied that you do.

To combine the two buildings into one plan, and assuming that you move the coach house into the main dwelling plan, open both plan files.

Go to the coach house drawing and using the edit area tool select all areas.  Copy that, then in the house and past the coach house in a location away from the house so that they do not overlap.  

Do not click on anything for now.  The geometric centre of the pasted coach house assembly will still be highlighted with a grip.  Click on that and drag the coach house to the desired position.  You can reuse the edit all tool to make final adjustments to the coach house's position if needed. 

You might want to make a new copy of the house file before doing this to keep the original plan files should you need to start over.

I did a brief video that illustrates one possible method for making the "shed dormer".

https://1drv.ms/v/s!Am8Ktm_KVQE5hP1wpWOfazmGUWO3Wg?e=SoF6sx